Rebecca Cheptegei’s killing highlights dangers of femicide in Kenya

The homicide of Olympic runner Rebecca Cheptegei by her former companion has reignited requires stronger motion towards femicide in Kenya.

The 33-year-old Ugandan died days after being doused in petrol and set alight by her ex-boyfriend at her residence in Trans Nzoia county in western Kenya.

This isn’t an remoted incident. Kenya has one of many highest charges of violence towards girls in Africa.

Media studies say that in January alone greater than 10 girls within the nation have been victims of femicide, defined by the UN because the killing of ladies due to their gender.

Jane, not her actual title, tells the BBC she has been in hiding for the higher a part of the yr.

She says she is unable to return to work because of life-changing accidents inflicted by her ex-partner throughout a brutal stabbing.

“His intention was to kill me. He stabbed me and left me for lifeless. Had been it not for the neighbours, I’d be lifeless,” Jane recollects.

She says she endured a long time of worsening abuse earlier than she left. Her breaking-point was when he began his aggression in direction of the kids, she says.

“It was hell dwelling with him. I don’t know the way I persevered for these a few years,” Jane provides.

Her estranged husband continues to harass her.

“I stay in worry. He says he desires to complete me off. I can’t sleep at night time. I’m now on remedy to assist with my psychological well being. I am not the perpetrator however I’m dwelling like I am in jail.”

A 2018 World Health Organization (WHO) report urged that 38% of ladies in Kenya aged between 15 and 49 had skilled violence from an intimate companion.

Teams that provide help to survivors of gender-based violence say there was a year-on-year improve within the variety of circumstances.

“On common, we obtain as much as 50 calls and generally 20 walk-ins in a day,” Njeri Migwi tells the BBC.

She is the pinnacle of Usikimye – Swahili for “do not be silent”.

In 2021, then President Uhuru Kenyatta declared gender-based violence “a nationwide disaster”.

A yr later, a government report discovered 41% of married girls had skilled bodily violence.

A survey by Africa Data Hub discovered that between 2016 and 2023, there have been greater than 500 reported circumstances of ladies being killed in Kenya.

“In 75% of circumstances, killings have been dedicated by an individual who knew the murdered girl – an intimate companion, relative or buddy,” the report says.

Sunita Caminha, UN Girls specialist on ending violence towards girls and women in East and southern Africa, says that girls and women of various backgrounds have been victims of femicide in a world marred by widespread gender discrimination and inequality.

Within the newest UN report on violence towards girls and women, Africa accounts for the most important share, with 20,000 girls murdered.

Lengthy-distance runner Joan Chelimo says the killing of Cheptegei has left her traumatised.

“I can not sleep, imagining that somebody was simply burnt alive,” she provides.

Cheptegei’s ex-partner subsequently additionally died of burn wounds that he sustained within the assault on her.

Ms Chelimo is a co-founder of Tirop’s Angels, an organisation shaped after the killing of one other athlete, Agnes Tirop.

She says that Cheptegei reported the abuse she confronted to police, however “nothing occurred”.

“So the perpetrators are usually not held accountable,” Ms Chelimo provides.

Police have denied claims that Cheptegei reported her life was in peril.

Kenya has handed legal guidelines to deal with gender-based violence, however critics say few concrete measures are in place to sort out the scourge.

Judy Gitau, the Africa regional director for marketing campaign group Equality Now, says that “sadly, governments usually really feel that when they’ve a regulation, that’s it – not understanding that legal guidelines do not execute themselves they usually do not implement themselves”.

Jane says that through the years her studies of abuse have been dismissed.

“Many occasions, the police say these are home quarrels. The truth is, one policewoman I spoke to mentioned: ‘We can not arrest him till he does one thing.’ I requested her: ‘Would you like him to kill me?’

“The subsequent day is when he stabbed me,” Jane recollects.

In 2004, police gender desks have been launched in Kenya to make it simpler for girls to report circumstances of gender-based violence, and for investigations to be sped up.

Nonetheless, solely half of police stations have them. Police say that is due to an absence of sources.

In Trans Nzoia, the place Cheptegei lived, there are 5 police stations, however none has gender desks – the one one is on the county headquarters, says Kennedy Apindi, the pinnacle of legal investigations within the county.

“So reporting of those circumstances is an issue. They’re reported late, or they’re unreported till you hear about them within the media and that’s when the police come into motion,” he provides.

Cheptegei was the third feminine athlete to die in Kenya allegedly by the hands of an intimate companion within the final three years.

In 2021, merely 5 weeks after Agnes Tirop broke a 10km road-running world document in Germany, she was discovered killed in her residence.

The 25-year-old had a number of stab wounds on her neck and stomach.

Her companion Ibrahim Rotich was arrested by police 640km (400 miles) away in Changamwe, on Kenya’s coast.

Three years after she was killed, the case remains to be in courtroom, with Mr Rotich out on bond. He has pleaded not responsible to a cost of homicide.

Different circumstances additionally run for years.

Ms Gitau, who sits on a judiciary committee set as much as assessment the timelines for circumstances involving gender-based violence, says the delays are unacceptable.

“There have to be prioritisation of GBV [gender-based violence],” she says.

Simply six months after Tirop’s killing, Kenyan-born Bahrain runner Damaris Muthee Mutua was discovered lifeless in her residence in Iten, a operating hub in Kenya’s Rift Valley.

A police post-mortem revealed that the 28-year-old had been strangled.

No one has been convicted of her killing.

Police mentioned they have been on the lookout for her boyfriend in reference to the demise.

Identical to Cheptegei, each athletes allegedly reported quarrels over cash and property with their companions earlier than assembly their deaths.

In lots of East African communities, gender-based violence is pushed by patriarchal beliefs, inserting girls in subordinate roles. Their independence is restricted, and violence is normalised as a type of management.

Ms Gitau is asking for extra secure homes for survivors.

“Deep down, our attitudes, the norms that we maintain as a rustic, nonetheless view girls in a sure gentle,” she says.

Expressing an identical view, Ms Chelimo says the substantial amount of cash that feminine athletes make, or stand to earn, leaves them susceptible.

“They go towards conventional gender norms… Feminine athletes are actually turning into extra impartial, financially impartial, and the opposite gender is de facto upset about it,” Ms Chelimo provides.

The federal government says it’s operating sensitisation programmes, whereas reviewing laws to sort out gender-based violence.

“We do not need this to occur to every other girl, whether or not an athlete, or from the village, or a younger lady. We have to be sure that the gender law enforcement officials are doing their work,” Rachel Kamweru from Kenya’s State Gender Division tells the BBC.

Jane says her life rests within the authorities’s palms, and she or he hopes that it’s going to do extra to guard girls like her from their ex-partners.

“So long as he’s free, I’ll by no means have peace,” she says.